by Jesse Wilson
“Of course. Anything you say, boss,” she replied to him and snapped her fingers. The six-infected climbed back into the van. It started up, turned around, and started to roll back down the road. One of the men on the line pointed his rifle and was just about to shoot the tires out. Terra narrowed her eyes and Bill looked at the rifleman.
“Stop, don’t shoot,” he cried out.
“We can’t let them get away,” he replied. “I got the feeling if we don’t. we’re all dead,” Bill said and Terra smiled.
“You’re very perceptive, I like it,” she said to him and the man lowered his gun carefully.
“Terra hates this town, you know, and everyone in it, but the world is a scary place, and it’s easier to deal with people you know,” she said and walked into the town. As the sun came up, people began to take notice of the small group walking with an obviously infected person and panic began to spread.
“Wait, everyone calm down. Terra, or, whatever, has said that she wouldn’t infect anyone else,” Bill said and Randall looked at him.
“I don’t remember any promises being made, Bill,” he replied to him. Terra just smiled.
“Of course I won’t ravage your little town here. Unless I don’t get what I want, then all bets could be off. But until then, you’re safe,” she replied to him and walked, looking at everyone as she did, crossing her black-veined arms.
No one was ready to get too close to her anyway, promise or not. It was about now Madison, Janine, and Cory came back to the main part of town to see what everyone else was seeing. None of them could believe it.
“Randall, get away from that thing, are you insane?” Janine screamed at him and got their attention. Terra looked at Madison right away and smiled at once.
“We meet again. I was wondering why you weren’t a part of me. I guess my plan didn’t work,” she said to her, and Madison instantly exploded in a rage. The voice and body was different, but it was the same evil. Maybe it was insanity, maybe it was blind rage that caused it, but Madison broke into a run and intended to beat the alien’s face in.
Terra leapt forward an inhuman amount to close the distance between them, grabbed her by the throat, and lifted her off the ground.
“For starters, your son is fine. He’s back in that other town you three left in such a hurry. Secondly, if you are so eager to die, that’s fine with me, but you should consider that I didn’t think the human race would destroy one of its cities just to try and stop me. I have a plan, so if you want me to break your neck right here, that’s fine. If not, just relax and I’ll put you down,” Terra said to her with a vicious edge to her voice now.
Madison had returned to her senses and knew that this was a suicidal thing to do. So, she relaxed as much as she could while being strangled and lifted in the air. Terra dropped her, and Madison’s hands went to her throat. She was coughing and trying to catch her breath.
Janine rushed to her side and helped her stand up.
“What I did to poor Patrick was a bad thing, I get that now, but if this plan works out, I promise I’ll return him and everyone who’s infected and still alive back to you,” she said to Madison and indeed to the rest of them. Cory stepped up.
“We got a message out to, well, someone. We think that the military is on its way here to take care of you, so if you’ll just wait and not kill anyone, that’d be great,” he said, and in an instant, Terra was standing next to him. No one saw her move.
“Kid, you’re a lifesaver,” she said and put her right arm around his shoulders.
Cory felt his blood run cold and a horrible shiver run down his spine.
“Thanks, I think,” he replied the only thing he could think of saying in a weak voice. Terra sighed and let Cory go after what felt like forever to him.
“I guess all we have to do now is wait, so what is there to do in this town?” she asked them and smiled. No one even knew what this thing might consider to be fun.
“Well, you need a message given out, right?” Janine asked Terra. She turned to look at her.
“Yes. I do. Do you have a way for me to do this?” Terra asked and trained her deep yellow eyes in her direction.
“Sorry, my phone doesn’t have a signal all the way out here,” Janine replied to her. Terra looked at her pocket.
“Let me see that thing,” she said.
Janine pulled her phone out and carefully handed it to her. Terra took the thing and inspected it.
“This will do,” she said and immediately flew straight up into the air.
“Holy crap,” Madison said as everyone watched her take off.
Terra was high above Ashwind, and with ease, opened the phone. She started to rearrange the wires on the inside for a few seconds.
“There, that should do it,” she said to herself and dialed a number. Someone picked up. “Hello, Bruce Williams, is this you?” she asked him.
“How did you…I mean…who is this?” Bruce answered.
“It’s me. You know, you stole my body before I could get to it, yeah? I am upset about that. So, to get to the point, I want to talk to you. So, meet me, okay?” she said impatiently.
“I don’t trust you, but alright. I’ll meet up with you,” Bruce said, and Terra’s new eyes widened with delight. She crushed the phone in her hand.
“Victory,” she said and smiled. Immediately, she realized that a location was never given. “Oh well, he’ll figure it out,” she said to herself, then began to descend back into the town below.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Across the galaxy, a Nuridian sentry monitoring a deep-space scanning station fell out of his chair when the screen suddenly came to life.
“What the snoz is this?” he hissed and stood back up. Luckily, he was alone and no one saw him fall to the hard metal floor. He punched in a few numbers and focused on the source of the disturbance.
“Oh,” was all he could say as his red eyes widened. He got up again, turned, and started to run towards the commanding officer’s station. It only took him a few minutes to get there. He could have used the communicator, but his mind was racing with the information. He burst into Ulrix’s office, out of breath.
“Sir, you’ve got to come see this,” he said all in one breath. Ulrix was startled and angered; these kids didn’t even remember how to knock.
“See what? What is it?” the old commander said, annoyed that he got demoted to deep-space duty ever since the Narbosaurus disaster a few years ago. The young Nuridian shook his head.
“Probe Number 616 M is activated and on route to Garmonbozia,” he said and Ulrix dropped his holopen.
“It has to be a malfunction,” he replied and stood up. “Wish it was, sir, but I checked it. The scan is tracking it,” the young officer replied as Ulrix moved around his desk and headed towards the door. He was right; this was something he had to see.
The two of them made their way back to the scanning room and there it was, just as the young officer had said. The probe was heading towards the weapon as fast as it could go.
“Point of origin?” Ulrix asked him, and the officer scanned the trail.
“It’s coming from the third planet in the Sol system. Sir, isn’t that where you sent the monster?” he timidly asked him. It was a sore spot for Ulrix, and most people who asked got sent to cleaning duty for a week.
“Yeah, it was and is,” he replied much to his surprise.
“Can we stop the probe by remote from here?” Ulrix asked him.
“No, we can’t do it from here; all we can do is tell who activated it. Here, I’ll play the request,” the officer said and did so.
“My name is Heather Mills, and we need help,” was all the voice said, translated through the computer.
“Humans, I should have known. I wish we never would have put their whole planet under the time stasis,” Ulrix said, annoyed about this development, but then he saw a chance to regain his lost glory.
“I’m going to Nurid Prime to report this myself. Don’t say a
word to anyone, or you’ll be wishing you had cleaning duty, do you understand?” Ulrix said to him and the officer shook his head.
“Yes, sir, no one will know, but you’d better hurry. If we detected it, other stations will see it very soon,” he replied to him.
“Don’t worry, I’m leaving now. I’ll take care of this problem,” Ulrix replied, turned around, and walked out. The officer watched the screen and wasn’t sure just how he was going to take care of it. He was just thankful that thing wasn’t coming in this direction and felt sorry for whoever was going to meet it.
Ulrix made his way directly to the shuttle bay, got into a ship without asking anyone for permission, and took off down the runway, leaving everyone there confused about what was going on. Ulrix was in a sea of emotions and internal questions.
If the beast lived, maybe Xule had somehow managed to survive too. It would be the only reason the probe would have been active now. He pushed his personal transport to its limit; he needed to get home because it was time to get to work.
The trip from the scanning station to Nurid only took about four Yius, but the trip seemed longer because of the state of mind he was in. So many questions, ideas, and past memories flooded up from nowhere. Before he knew it, he was entering the Nuridian atmosphere and had to start the landing procedure.
“Attention vessel, your arrival is unscheduled. Please state intent of your business here,” an emotionless voice came through the communicator.
“This is Commander Ulrix, I have important, sensitive information for the Prime Scale. Clear me for landing at once, or I’ll make sure you never work in space traffic control again,” he replied angrily into the communicator.
“Yes, sir, sorry, we were unaware it was you, your transponder is deactivated,” the voice replied back, much more on edge this time. Ulrix looked up and saw that he really did forget to turn it on.
“Uh, sorry,” he replied and switched it on.
“You’re clear to land on pad eighteen when ready,” the voice replied to him, but Ulrix wasn’t interested in talking anymore. He flew through the orange sky and highlighted pad eighteen.
Within minutes, he was on solid ground again. The door opened and he got out of the ship, talking to nobody as he stepped on a teleporter a short distance away. He pushed the button and was gone just like that in a blue flash. In seconds, he was outside of the Nuridian Palace. He walked straight to the main gate, and two massive guards in vicious-looking power armor stopped him.
“Sorry, Commander, but no one is allowed in right now. The Prime Scale is in an important conference with the space alliance,” the one on the left said.
“You’ve got to let me in, this is more important,” Ulrix replied to him, becoming impatient.
“Sorry, we can’t let you in; these are the orders we have,” the one on the left said in an altered voice.
“Listen to me, you over grown space mutants. Garmonbozia is about to be awakened and some very bad things are going to happen if it does. The Prime Scale should know about this as soon as possible, now get out of my way,” he ordered them. The name was almost like some mythical beast that they knew from stories, but had never seen. It caused them to move out of the way.
“Hurry up; if anyone asks how you got in, we didn’t see you,” the one on the right said to him. Ulrix took his chance and walked right through the main gate to the palace’s conference room. It was easy to find because he had been here a few times before.
The guards outside the room looked at the commander and raised their spear weapons.
“Halt, you can’t come in here,” one of them said, but instead of trying to convince them otherwise, he tore the left guards’ weapon away from him, spun it around, and in one fluid motion, hit them both in the head, knocking them out easily.
“Rookies,” Ulrix said and threw the weapon down as he opened the doors. Inside were seven highly overdressed rulers of the planetary alliance. They all looked at him as he stepped inside.
“What is the meaning of this intrusion?” the Dolrum Queen hissed. The Yolomite King reached for his blaster, and the Prime Scale stood up at once.
“Ulrix, you’d better have a good reason for intruding like this,” she said to him and narrowed her red eyes.
“I do, I wouldn’t have come otherwise,” he replied. He brought up his wrist computer and created a hologram map of the track of Probe 616 M.
“One of the old probes has been activated. It’s going to wake up Garmonbozia and its heading towards the third sol planet,” Ulrix said what they could all plainly see.
“How is this possible? All the old weapons were decommissioned,” the yeti-like Yolomite King said in an angry voice, but to be fair, all Yolomites sounded like they were always angry all the time.
“This is all your fault, Nuridian; we know of your Xeloid fiasco. You sent Narbosaurus into the abyss and this is the result,” the Dolrum Queen hissed, and the others all started to talk at once in confusion and worry. Prime Scale slammed her staff into the ground.
“Enough. We will treat this issue with the same respect as any other and deal with the blame once it’s been resolved. While it is true all of the old weapons had been decommissioned, Garmonbozia and its probes were lost to the vastness of space. With the Xeloid threat gone and the probes looking only for that DNA, we figured it would be alright just to leave it alone,” she said to them and continued. “Apparently, we were wrong,” she said, taking responsibility for what happened.
“What are we going to do?” the Yolomite King said, asking what they all had on their mind.
“We will rally our forces and assist the humans. Obviously, Narbosaurus is loose on the planet and our weapon is going there to sterilize the whole planet. We’ve made this mess, we are going to help fix it,” she replied to them. Ulrix smiled, but the Prime Scale looked at him.
“Commander, you’ll lead the Nuridian Fleet to Earth, and each member here will contribute to the cause. If the weapon destroys the time stasis shield, the true threat will be released and our victory will be cut short,” Prime Scale said to him with a glare.
Ulrix didn’t want to lead the fleet; it was the same as a death sentence.
“I’ll do it,” he replied to her and turned off the hologram.
“Good, go to the bases and prepare the fleets,” she said and turned to the other leaders. “We do need to work together on this, because all of our fates are tied to the outcome. This meeting is over. Go home and summon the armies. We are going to war,” she said to them, and one by one, they started to teleport away.
She looked at Ulrix again and could only sigh.
“Personally, I blame you for this mess, but I understand; it was better than letting those nasty pirates get the prize. Oh well, let’s get started. Welcome back, Commander,” she said and Ulrix, for the first time in years, smiled.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
They watched Las Vegas be turned into an inferno as the military dropped their weapons on the city. “Those maniacs actually did it,” Bob said as an afterthought. None of them could believe the things they were seeing on TV.
“I always knew the government takeover would happen, but I didn’t think they would make up such an insane story. A giant monster and an alien virus? Give me a break,” Gordon said angrily as he slipped back into denial as the disbelief of what he was seeing hit him. Gordon was a strange case. Most preppers would buy the alien story without a second thought; he didn’t believe in such things despite seeing it.
“No, it’s all real. The alien monster and the infection story. I’ve seen it. There are two aliens, if you can believe it. A lizard and something a little slimier,” Alex replied to him as he could almost feel the flames through the television. Gordon was uncomfortable even watching this, and the rest of the group could tell he was on a bad edge. It was also very clear the man didn’t believe anything the media had to say.
Rose spoke up, “Hey, Gordo, maybe you can show me around your bunker so I can get used
to it more?” she said to him, trying to distract him from the horrific scene that was being displayed on the screen and triggering all of his bad side at once.
“Actually, that’s a good idea. Who knows how long we’ll be down here,” he said and got up, but he was shaky as he did it, and the two of them walked off.
A few seconds after he did, the screen changed over to the view of the president standing behind his podium with an equally stunned media group around him.
“I tragically report that Las Vegas was sterilized. An alien entity had taken root in the city, and there was no way to remove it. We don’t know how many people got to the evacuation points, but if we would have waited, the entire country, no, the entire world, might have been at risk,” President Carr said and took a deep breath, trying his best to keep his composure during all of this.
“I need you to know we had no choice in the matter. However, martial law is still in place, and the rules haven’t changed at all. If you break them, you do so at your own risk. The situation will remain the same until you are updated. This could be a few days; it could be weeks. We don’t know,” he said into the camera with the most authoritative voice he could summon.
“I know you all have questions about the attack, the alien threat, and everything else. Right now, we aren’t at liberty to answer any of those questions for your own safety and security,” he added and started to walk off the podium when suddenly gunshots rang out, and the scene turned into one of chaos as the secret service agents sprang into action at once.
“You killed my family, you bastard. You killed all of them!” a reporter screamed out as he was tackled at once. It was clear to see that the gun had been hidden in his camera.
The president was rushed out of the room at once as everyone else was cleared out. The suspect was taken away quickly. One situation was replaced by another as the assassination attempt took place, and no one knew if he was dead or not.
“This day just keeps getting stranger by the minute, but on the bright side, I never liked the guy anyway,” Bob said, and Heather punched him in the arm for his remark. “Not cool,” she said angrily to him.